ORRCA Ouray Regional Recreation Conservation Alliance

OURAY REGIONAL RECREATION & CONSERVATION ALLIANCE

ORRCA is a coalition of a broad group of regional stakeholders that convened in September 2021 with the help of a capacity building grant from the Colorado Outdoor Regional Partnership (CO-OP) Funding Program.

The 2021-2023 capacity building grant documents, contracts, products, progress, and financials are organized in the tabs below.

In May 2021, ORRCA visionaries submitted an application for a coalition capacity building grant to Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW). The founders' aim for ORRCA is to collaboratively address emerging issues and safeguard areas identified as significant for conservation, working lands, and recreation access in alignment with Colorado's 2019 Statewide Comprehensive Outdoor Recreation Plan (SCORP).

 

In June 2021, ORRCA's conveners learned the grant was awarded. The convening partners garnered broad support and worked together as a convening committee to create the new ORRCA cooperative coalition. ORRCA began it's work to form and build relationships and bridges across jurisdictional and land ownership boundaries to plan for wildlife and natural resource conservation along with the growing demand for recreation access.

 

Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW)'s goal for RPI-grant funded Capacity Building Coalitions is to ultimately develop a Regional Conservation and Recreation Plan following the key elements developed by the CO-OP: 1. Vision 2. Goals & Measurable Objectives 3. Conservation Goals & Needs 4. Outdoor Recreation Goals & Needs 5. Priority Actions & Projects 6. Implementation & Monitoring. 

 

The StoryMap below explains in detail who we are and where we work.

 
Thank you to our dedicated convening partners and stakeholders!
 
 

2021-2023 CO-OP/RPI Grant Deliverables

ADDITIONAL REQUIRED DELIVERABLES: 
  • ORRCA Organizationa Structure, Charter, and By-Laws
  • High-value wildlife habitat and conservation focus areas that are high-priority for conservation or enhancement projects to protect habitat, biodiversity, water, wildlife, cultural and/or scenic preservation goals. Note: Colorado Parks and Wildlife is providing geospatial modeling to identify wildlife species sensitivity. We envision presenting this data as an interactive public online ArcGIS atlas. Spring 2023 stakeholder discussions involved learning about using CODEX. As a fee-for-service Colorado Natural Heritage Program can create a Conservation Values Summary model and dedicated ORRCA layers within the CODEX tool.
  • Outdoor recreational infrastructure inventory and high-priority recreation focus areas - identified as needing infrastructure that can also mininmize or avoid conflicts with high value conservation areas.
  • ORRCA stakeholders identified that an inventory of critical working landscapes infrastructure is desired to help mitigate or prevent conflicts with recreation.
  • Prioritized list of conservation and recreation projects to accomplish within 1 to 5 years.
  • Grant tracking of cash and in-kind expenditures, submittal of invoices to Ouray County as fiscal agent, and preparation of required reports, including a semi-annual grant report providing ORRCA's status and summarizing milestones achieved.
  • Representation of ORRCA at CPW CO-OP/RPI meetings and conferences as requested.
Desired but not required deliverables for the 2021-2023 grant:
  • Draft ORRCA Regional Recreation and Conservation Plan.
  • Strategies and implementation plan for increasing community engagement and stewardship actions.
  • Permanent ORRCA website.
  • Pathway to sustainable 501 (c)(3) organization.
  • Framework to expand the ORRCA geographic scope or region into adjacent communities.